Conventionally, as described in JP2002-240661A, a parking assist apparatus for a vehicle is known which calculates a course to a target position for parking the vehicle on the basis of a positional relation between a current vehicle position and the target position when a shift lever of the vehicle is set to a back position, and displays the calculation result on a monitor.
However, according to JP2002-240661A described above, the course to the target position is calculated when the shift lever is set to the back position. As a result, if it is found that the vehicle can not be parked at the target position when the shift lever is set to the back position, the target position or the vehicle position need to be changed. Accordingly, extra time is required to complete parking the vehicle, which increases a burden on a user of the vehicle.
A need thus exists for a parking assist apparatus which enables a vehicle to be parked at a target position for parking the vehicle in a shorter time, which increases a level of convenience for a user. The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances and provides such a parking assist apparatus.